Incentive
by JMcK
Summary: The BAU team lives the hell of the other side of the story.
1. Chapter 1

**Incentive**

Chapter One

_Don't think there are no crocodiles because the water is calm._

- Malayan Proverb

…

It was a Friday night.

A particularly upbeat one.

They'd saved the lives of two young women, cuffed the unsub without a single shot fired.

Now they were back in town.

Taking it easy, for once in their over-stressed lives.

Crammed into a back booth at a local bar-and-grill that was fast becoming a favorite, the five jet-setting members of the BAU team dug into a platter of nachos and started in on their first round of drinks.

Morgan laughed harder than anyone when Reid fumbled a salsa-topped tortilla chip onto his shirt.

Emily laughed harder than that when JJ 'accidentally' dropped a similar dab of salsa on Morgan's sleeve.

"Kill joy!" Morgan teased.

"Bully," JJ returned sweetly.

And he smeared a trail of salsa from his shirt onto her cheek, and they all laughed some more.

It was rare, this kind of night. Wrapping up a case on a high note, just in time to end the week like the 9-to-5 crowd.

The whole weekend stretched ahead of them, as long as nothing came up.

On nights like these, JJ's cell phone was something like a dreaded bomb that threatened to go off.

There was a chorus of groans when it rang.

"Relax," JJ admonished. "It's personal."

"How personal?" Morgan asked, his lips twisting into a suggestive smile.

JJ threw a smiling eye-roll his way, and jabbed the 'send' button on her Blackberry.

"Hey Pen," she greeted Garcia warmly. "You got my message?"

"Yours and everyone else's."

"And you called me just to make the others panic," JJ stated unnecessarily.

She could _hear_ Garcia's grin.

"Did anyone curse aloud? Tell me someone cursed aloud."

"I'll tell you we all cursed like sailors if you'll show up."

"Jaje, you know I'd be only too happy to join you if I didn't already have a date."

"Your loss," JJ told her, sighing a bit. "Morgan and Reid are both wearing salsa, and we're still on the first round."

"I'm sorry," Morgan interjected loudly, leaning in toward JJ's phone. "Morgan and Reid and _who_?"

JJ swatted him away.

"Pay him no mind," she instructed Garcia. "And think about ditching your date the second you feel a hint of boredom."

"Will do."

"All right."

"Ten-four!" Garcia's cheery voice boomed into the phone loud enough for the others to hear, and then the connection was broken.

"Think we'll see her tonight?" Emily inquired.

"God willing," JJ mused. "We're outnumbered by the boys club tonight."

She smiled gently at Hotch across the table, hoping he knew that, truth be told, she was glad he'd agreed to join them.

He hadn't said much all night.

He didn't often come along when the rest of them went out.

But without Haley and Jack to go home to, JJ worried for his mental health if he didn't come along on these post-case de-stressing sessions.

And she worried for their collective mental health if they ever lost him.

"JJ?" he asked, looking just the slightest bit unsettled that she'd been looking him over.

And because she was quick with a cover, her reply was immediate and effortless:

"Darts," she suggested. "I dare you. Five bucks a game."

…

"You don't have to do that," Emily insisted, when they'd had their fill for the night and Hotch told the waitress to bring just one bill.

"Seriously, Hotch, you're not paying for our drinks," Morgan joined in.

JJ couldn't resist rubbing salt in Hotch's wounds –

"He already paid for my drinks," she pointed out, and Hotch met her spirited smile with a rueful smile of his own.

"Never again," he commented.

"Don't feel too bad," Emily assured him. "JJ and darts is like Reid and Sudoku."

"And if you're the competitive type, it makes for an expensive night," Morgan put in.

"I should have put two and two together," Hotch turned his gaze to JJ. "I've seen you at the firing range."

The triumph on her face turned to near-blushing pride at that, just as their waitress arrived with their bill and a handful of peppermints.

Hotch reached for the former (and Reid, for the latter), and Morgan met Hotch's eyes and opened his mouth to speak.

"Derek, let me do this," Hotch instructed simply and quietly, and their gaze held, and he wondered if the first name was too much, if paying the bill was too much, if it was too obvious that he missed having people to pay for.

"It's hot in here," Reid muttered through a mouthful of peppermint, effectively breaking the short silence.

"Why don't you go ahead to the car," Hotch offered, looking at each of the others so they'd know he meant all of them. "I'll put this on my card and meet you out there."

They all seemed reasonably agreeable, and they made their way toward the door in comfortable silence until Reid crashed into the doorframe.

The resulting laughter – punctuated by cheerful accusations of drunkenness – faded as they went.

Hotch tempered his smile and glanced over the bill, realizing with amusement that he was paying for JJ's night twice over.

He signed off and followed after them.

He'd volunteered to be designated driver, which meant he got to see them all safely home.

They'd had to park way across the lot, and he spotted them before they spotted him coming.

He spotted them just before a rag was pressed so hard against his mouth and nose that it hurt.

They were oblivious as he mentally identified the sickly sweet smell, unconcerned as he reached for his sidearm and had his reach blocked, and his arm quickly -- and painfully -- twisted around behind him.

It was mere seconds before he felt darkness beginning to close in.

But he had enough time to spot too many dark figures coming up behind JJ and Reid and Morgan and Prentiss.

(Four of the people he had left.)

Just enough time to remember that none of them were armed tonight.

Just enough time to form a desperate one-word plea.

No sound made it past his lips.

But he screamed it inside of his head –

_RUN!!!_

…

The room was windowless.

It was the first thing Hotch noticed when he opened his eyes.

A few thoughts raced through his murky mind, the least comforting of which was a realization that the chilly space wasn't entirely unlike a predator's nest.

It was empty save for a table and four chairs.

A table and four chairs, and his team.

The sight of them hit like a splash of cool water.

_They hadn't run. _

Only Morgan was conscious, slumped against the wall and staring back at him.

He looked frozen, dejected. And in his eyes, quietly enraged.

"Are you hurt?" Hotch called to him, and it wasn't until he heard his own barely-steady voice that it occurred to him that the sound of something like a fan was whirring softly nearby.

"Fine," Morgan said shortly. "You?"

"I don't think fine is the word, but I'm not hurt."

Groggy, yes, Hotch acknowledged to himself. But not hurt.

He struggled to right himself, to move toward the others.

He reached Emily first, grasped her wrist to check for her pulse.

"Already did that," Morgan announced. "They're okay. They're just lighter. Makes sense they'd be out longer."

Hotch started to nod, but Emily had stirred at the contact of his fingers, and her eyes opened now.

She jerked away, startled, when she woke to find Hotch leaning over her in the unfamiliar setting, and she stumbled almost directly onto both Reid and JJ, behind her.

"What..." Emily swallowed hard and shook her head. "Where…?" She tried to catch her breath, wide-eyed and horrified as she took in the rather sterile-looking room.

"Does anything hurt?" Hotch questioned her, but it was Reid's voice that answered quietly from the floor.

"My side," he mumbled, and though they all turned their attention his way, no one bothered to mention that Emily had just stepped on him.

"JJ?" Reid half called and half asked, finding her next to him. "JJ?"

"She's okay," Hotch told him. "Just give her a minute."

Reid looked up at him, mouth hanging open slightly. And then he pulled himself into a sitting position, and joined Emily in looking over the room.

They were all silent for a long moment, a painfully familiar reality that usually to belonged to someone else just beginning to sink in.

"Is there…" Reid started, finally. Quietly. Timidly. _Desperately_. "Is there any chance at all this is some kind of prank, or, like, um… training exercise, or --"

"Reid --" Hotch tried to interject.

"No, really, Hotch, this isn't a predatory abductor's nest! It's not. There's a functional table and chairs, not a surgical table or a bed or, like…" He struggled to find the rest of the sentence, and switched gears. "And the five of us are together! That doesn't fit the profile."

"That this isn't a predatory abductor doesn't mean all's well, Reid," Morgan pointed out, and what he was about to say next was lost in a confused uttering of Hotch's name that floated up from the floor.

"Yeah, JJ," Hotch responded quietly.

And he thought about following it up with something like 'it's okay'.

But it would have been empty sentiment, and he usually caught himself before speaking that kind of thing out loud.

"We're all here," he said instead, which was both true and potentially comforting.

"Why?" JJ asked, her eyes searching the room warily rather than processing it as a whole.

"We were out, we went for drinks and --"

"No, I remember," she told him, and she tried to lick her parched lips. "I just…" She paused, tried to piece the question together, her mind still less than clear. "Why would someone… why take all of us? Why would an unsub do that?"

It was the kind of curious question she usually asked on the way to a crime scene.

Except for the sheer dread in her tone.

"Hotch?" she pressed, when he'd said nothing for a moment.

He looked over at her, met her anxious eyes, reluctant to talk about what might come next for them.

And she asked the only question that mattered:

"What do you think they want?"

…


	2. Chapter 2

_Author's note: I forgot to mention at the beginning of the first chapter that this takes place sometime between Gideon leaving and Rossi arriving. (Rossi has yet to win me over.) _

_Thanks very much to everyone who reviewed. Means a lot. This story is, admittedly, a little bit out there, and a little bit self-indulgent. I'm writing it mainly because it's in my head, but if someone else can enjoy it, that's awesome. I loved that people caught the little implications. _

_I'd love to hear from you about this one… _

**Incentive**

Chapter Two 

…

_Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent._

- Isaac Asimov

…

She was only trying to distract him.

Reid was sure of this, as he rambled in response to JJ's question about the effects of chloroform.

"It was developed as an anaesthetic in the middle of the nineteenth century," he informed her. "It depresses the central nervous system and brings about unconsciousness quickly. It could only be used for simple operations, because its effects are relatively brief."

JJ nodded at him, focusing intently on his words.

Apparently she was willing to pretend he was doing her a favor.

But that was okay.

Distractions were good.

"It was a good alternative to ether because ether often left the patient with post-surgery side effects," he continued gratefully. "Nausea and vomiting. Which, uh, is good, I mean, that these guys used chloroform, because we're not…" He let his voice trail off, their situation weighing on his mind. He added as an afterthought: "Not that any of this is good."

JJ offered him a hard-to-read, uncertain smile, and he wondered what she wasn't saying.

Across the room, Hotch was watching them.

"What are you thinkin'?" Morgan asked, and Hotch answered without turning his head.

"I'm trying to figure out whether we haven't used the chairs because we don't want to use anything provided by the unsubs, or because someone would be left on the floor."

"Seems to me we'd do better profiling them than us," Morgan pointed out, and Hotch turned to look at him.

"We don't have much to go on, until they take some kind of action. We know they used chloroform rather than brute force, and so we're probably dealing with unsubs who don't want any more trouble than necessary."

"Which would suggest they have a singular purpose that we're a part of," Morgan noted.

Hotch nodded.

"When JJ asked, my first thought was that we had to kill someone that mattered to whoever is doing this, and this is revenge. That's why I didn't give her a real answer."

"And now? You've thought it through?"

Hotch sighed and looked the room over one more time, committing to what he was going to say.

"I think he needs us, our skill set. He wants us to work, hence the table and chairs."

Hotch met Morgan's eyes, bracing himself for the question that would make him give voice to the feeling of dread that was quietly brewing inside him.

"Why just the four chairs, then?"

And there it was.

Hotch waited a moment before answering, trying to find the right words.

"If they need us to work, they know who we are. They probably know JJ isn't a profiler." He paused, considered his phrasing again. "I hope that means they only took her because she was with us."

Their eyes met again, meaningfully, and as Morgan's mind began considering what possible use these unsubs could have for their team liaison, JJ was approaching Emily in the corner of the room.

"Hey," JJ greeted quietly.

"Hey," Emily returned, barely looking up.

JJ stood over her in silence for a moment, then spoke up:

"You feel okay, Em?"

Pulled from dark thoughts, Emily looked up and over at JJ, her eyes narrowing.

"Physically? More or less. Do I not look okay?"

"You look fine," JJ assured her.

But as JJ settled her shaky limbs into a seat on the floor next to Emily, her unease was palpable.

The fear in her eyes seemed too _specific_, too _imminent_ to be what the rest of them were feeling.

"Hey - what's up?" Emily asked, concern and a barely detectable note of alarm in her tone. "What's wrong?"

Just a hint of tears shone in JJ's eyes.

"I don't, um…" JJ shook her head, drew in a less than steady breath. "I don't think I'm okay," she finally admitted. "You all seem okay, and Reid doesn't think there are any specific side effects from chloroform…"

"Tell me," Emily prompted calmly, shifting into crisis management mode, turning her body to face JJ. "Tell me what's happening."

Before JJ could respond, Hotch called out from across the room:

"Is something else wrong?"

"She doesn't feel well," Emily answered for her, and JJ looked less than thrilled at the announcement as the three men made their way over.

"Are you on any medications?" Reid asked, looking her over curiously. "Something that could react with the chloroform, or the environment?"

"Maybe an allergy?" Morgan suggested.

Hotch wanted to suggest that it could be some kind of psychosomatic response to the stress, but he held back, because JJ might feel it meant she was weaker than the rest of them, and he knew better than anyone how that would eat away at her.

"It's okay," JJ insisted. "I'm probably just overreacting."

She forced a rather self-deprecating smile.

But they weren't profilers for nothing.

Hotch observed, and found it odd, that she was favoring her left arm, holding it tight against her body, clenching and unclenching her fist.

He opened his mouth to ask if they'd manhandled her into an injury.

But before he could say anything, a mechanical sound signalled the opening of the room's only door.

They all stood as the steel barrier slid aside to allow two masked men to enter.

And they all exchanged a slightly hopeful glance at that, because the black ski masks were a good thing.

If these men didn't want their faces seen, there was hope.

"Settling in, are we?" the taller of the two figures asked conversationally, stepping forward.

And every one of his captives – JJ included – made a mental note that he was the dominant.

Also noted by everyone present was the fact that both men were heavily armed.

"If you tell us what you need, we can have this overwith quickly," Hotch said carefully, stepping out in front of the others.

"Gladly," The Dominant replied, and while his mouth was hidden, it seemed to Hotch he was smiling.

It took only a nod of The Dominant's head for The Submissive to step forward and drop a thick file folder on the table that separated the two groups.

"I've heard only excessively good things about your work on the Garner case," The Dominant told them, by way of beginning an explanation. "As I understand it, young Agent Reid is quite the master of the cipher."

"Um, that, that was… that was a book code," Reid fumbled for words. "Garner was convinced he was a mythical figure called The Fisher King, and he came up with elaborate clues to lead us --"

"Your point, Agent Reid?"

The Dominant was, apparently, not a patient man.

And as everyone filed that away, Reid responded:

"Yes, I cracked his code. With help."

"You have help now," The Dominant pointed out, gesturing _with his gun_ to the others.

"What's in the file?" Hotch moved them along.

"An encoded message, revealing the location of a particular shipment of goods that I intend to intercept. Also some extensive background on the man who came up with the code." He sounded like he was smiling again as he added: "And yes, I tried to force a decoding out of him. But you'd be surprised what you can't live through."

Ignoring the chill that shot through him at that, Hotch took another step forward, praying that what he was about to do wouldn't backfire.

"You can let Agent Jareau go," he started, gesturing behind him, at JJ, with one hand. "She's our liaison. She's not a profiler."

"Oh, I'm well aware," The Dominant responded, and then he chuckled. "I had a good laugh about it. Does no one else appreciate the humor in the fact that the one member of your team not capable of profiling is the blonde?"

JJ fixed him with a steely gaze, but his gun pointed at them all kept her mouth shut.

"She could be capable," Hotch responded calmly, weighing his words as he continued, wanting to build in an 'out', in case he was going about this the wrong way. "She's worked closely with us for years, and she understands a lot of the basic principles. She's just never taken the courses. I do think we can do this without her. But that doesn't mean she can't serve a purpose here if need be."

"Oh, she serves a purpose," The Dominant shared, contentedly. "She serves a very specific purpose. Tell me, Agent Jareau, how do you feel?"

It took a moment for what he might be implying to hit them, and when it did Morgan stepped forward and spoke in a low growl:

"What did you do?"

But The Dominant kept his eyes on JJ, watching her shoulders rise and fall slightly as her breath quickened with fear, watching her eyes as she processed the fact that she felt the way she did _for a reason_.

"They say it starts with a severe burning sensation at the site of the puncture wound," The Dominant shared, as if they were chatting about the weather. "Then the headache sets in. Sound about right?"

"What did you do to her?" Hotch echoed Morgan's question, a hint of urgency tainting his calm.

The Dominant ignored him, watching them.

Agent Prentiss had stepped up behind the blonde, supporting her with one arm. Agent Reid was too frightened to be a problem. Agent Hotchner hadn't moved from his position in front of his team, and his stony expression hadn't changed.

It was Agent Morgan who looked ready to pounce, which called for a warning.

"Just for the record," The Dominant started, "Just because the blonde is particularly expendable doesn't mean the rest of you aren't. I know you're all accustomed to playing hero, but you'd do well to remember that I don't necessarily need four of you."

He turned his back on them and headed for the door, completely confident that The Submissive and his weapon had them covered.

He turned back just before he reached the door, and leaned casually against it.

"We're on a clock here. The twelve hours I have to intercept the shipment before it falls into the wrong hands is my clock. The eleven hours you have before the toxin becomes fatal is yours."

He pulled a remote from his pocket, and hit a button to open the door.

Then, smiling at their wide-eyed faces, he added:

"That's eleven hours, give or take."

…


	3. Chapter 3

_Author's note: I've made an effort to do some basic research, and I do have a specific toxin in mind, but I'm no doctor or scientist, so there may well be improbabilities (or worse) in certain related details from here on in. _

_Thanks again for such a great response to the last chapter. You guys are awesome. Each time a review lands in my inbox, it sends me right back to work._

_Please do let me know what you think of this one. _

**Incentive**

Chapter Three

…

_What you risk reveals what you value._

- Jeannette Winterson

…

"Reid, what do you know about poisons?"

Hotch pitched the question to him the second their captors had disappeared behind closed doors.

But Reid was in something of a stupor, his eyes locked on JJ's face, his mouth poised to speak, but at a loss for words.

"Reid?!" Hotch said again, louder and with more urgency.

Reid's head snapped around to face him.

"What do you know about poisons?" Hotch asked again.

"What can we do?" Emily tacked on her own question, and Reid visibly collected his thoughts.

"Um, assuming -- assuming that the time frame he's provided is accurate, and he mentioned headache rather than nausea, it's most likely some kind of neurotoxin." Each word came out faster than the last, and he wondered if he'd be able to stop without being stopped. "It may be -- it might – there have been recent attempts to refine the venom of animal predators from the Pacific --"

"Reid!" Emily called his name sharply, and he spun to face her. "What. Can. We. Do."

She sounded carefully focused, but her eyes pleaded with him to provide a solution.

And he wasn't sure he could.

"There's just, no real…" He tried to meet JJ's numb, staring gaze, but she looked right through him. "JJ?"

Her eyes focused and met with his, but she said nothing, and he wondered if she was going into some kind of shock.

Morgan stepped up behind her, rubbed her shoulders, near her neck, with strong hands.

"Hey," he nearly whispered, his mouth directed toward her ear. "You know we've got you covered, right? We'll figure this out."

She tipped her head back, doubt in her expression.

"Eleven hours?"

"Give the genius one or two," Morgan returned, giving her shoulders another comforting squeeze, and then all eyes fell on Reid again.

Hotch spoke up, always ready to keep them on track:

"Any first aid suggestions at all?"

"If it was an actual invenomation, a snake bite --" Reid started.

"If that's the best protocol we've got, go with it," Hotch instructed.

And at that, Reid was able to jump into action.

"Immobilize victim," he spat out quicky, mentally reading from a book he'd skimmed last year, and Morgan grabbed one of the four available chairs. JJ dropped into it willingly, and all eyes returned to Reid.

"Use -- Um, apply --" Reid stopped himself, and explained rather apologetically. "It doesn't all apply. You can't suck venom from an injection, and three out of five American ER doctors recommend against it anyway. And there's 'apply cold compress', but we don't have one to apply. They say to tie light, restricting bands above and below the site of the wound…?"

He looked around, at each of them, hopefully, but didn't immediately spot anything that could be useful.

"The one time you're not wearing a tie," Morgan muttered in frustration, his eyes landing on Hotch briefly.

And there was just a second of silence for Hotch to feel absurdly guilty for that, before Emily spoke up excitedly.

"My boots! Uh, have laces!"

It took her all of about fifteen seconds to get her boots yanked off of her feet and the laces disentangled from them, and then she went to JJ's side, speaking over her shoulder to Reid.

"How tight do we want these? Should you do it? Is this going to hurt?"

"Tie it tight with one of your own fingers underneath, so that when it's removed --"

"I need my fingers to tie."

"Here," Morgan offered, volunteering his own hands for either task.

And they set to work as Reid turned to Hotch, telling him, miserably:

"I think that's all I can do. There's something about elevating the victim's legs, but I think that's only if the bite is in the ankle, not an injection in the arm. We don't have antiseptic cleanser and we can't administer electroshock and we can't get her to an emergency room and there's just --"

"Reid," Hotch interrupted. "The bands on her arm will help. You helped."

"How do you know that? Do you know about this?"

He sounded suddenly hopeful.

Truth be told, Hotch had no idea what was going to happen, or whether the bands on JJ's arm would have any positive effect.

But empty sentiment didn't seem like such a bad idea right now.

"I'm sure. You helped. And you're our best chance of getting her and the rest of us out of here."

Hotch clapped Reid on the back as he passed him to approach JJ, leaving Reid to mutter to himself:

"No pressure, or anything."

Hotch glanced at the redness and swelling between Emily's shoelaces, then met JJ's eyes.

"Are you going to be all right for a bit if we all focus on the code?"

JJ nodded.

He'd figured she would.

He wanted to ask if she was sure, but he knew she'd say she was.

"You tell us if anything changes," he told her sternly. "That's an order from your boss."

She nodded again.

He noted that she was breathing through her mouth. And looking distractedly at Reid.

Morgan pulled his attention away, standing next to him now, announcing:

"We need a game plan."

Hotch turned, met his gaze.

"You have one in mind?"

"I say we put Em and Reid on the code itself, and you and me see what we can figure out about the guy who came up with it, how that might matter."

"I'm not sure we'll be able to figure out how it might matter without Reid. He's studied methods of encoding."

"I know that," Morgan countered. "He probably knows if there's a pattern to who uses what kind of systems. I agree. I'm saying we let them get started with number logic and we sift through this stuff so we can give the kid some kind of summary to work with."

Hotch thought it over for only a moment, then nodded.

Emily, standing next to them, looked agreeable.

Reid was kneeling in front of JJ, shaking his head about something, talking too quietly to be overheard.

"Spence, please," JJ pressed him, her voice just barely wavering. "Please."

"It's not going to matter, okay, because --"

"It matters to me!"

"We're going to find the solution and get out of here long before --"

"You don't know that."

Tears filled her eyes, and he dropped his own eyes to the floor.

JJ looked up at the rest of them, looking for support on her side.

"I deserve to know, don't I? What to expect?"

And suddenly it made sense to Hotch, what Reid was refusing to say.

None of them hurried to take sides.

Reid tried to answer without really answering:

"He already told you to expect pain at the site and headache."

"Check and check." There was anger building in JJ's tone, but whether it was directed at him or the fact that those two symptoms had already set in, he wasn't sure. "And then death," she continued, bluntly. "I'm asking you what comes in between."

"The, uh, the headache will probably get worse," he admitted, and then he started to stand, hoping she'd let it go.

She grabbed his hand, pulled him back down.

And he couldn't be annoyed with the frustration in her tone, because he could see on her face the things she'd never say in front of Hotch.

Maybe not in front of any of them.

How scared she was.

How badly it already hurt.

"And?" she prompted.

He tried to take her hand and only caught three fingers.

He squeezed them anyway, and told her:

"If… _if _we can't get you out of here for a while… probably some difficulty taking deep breaths. Probably blurred vision, eventually. Progressive weakness. And if it got this far -- and it really won't – it turns into paralysis before…"

She stared at him for a moment, letting it all sink in.

And when she nodded, she nodded so as to let her hair fall across her face, a shield between herself and the others.

"JJ…"

"I'm good. But I'm going to sit on the floor. Over there. Get them to get to work."

She placed her hands on his shoulders to push herself up from the chair, and he stood with her.

"If you need anything…" He tried. "If anything changes…"

"Just get them to work, okay?"

She headed for the corner of the room, distancing herself from them.

Reid barely caught sight of Morgan stopping Emily from going after her, just out of the corner of his eye.

It felt wrong to him, too, to leave her alone right now, and he hesitated for a few seconds more.

But he knew. He understood.

All she really wanted was the space to break down.

And she had a point. They had to get to work.

He took the chair she'd vacated and moved to the table, and the others followed suit.

He'd just taken hold of the page of inexplicable numbers when Hotch whispered, too quietly to be heard across the room:

"What did you leave out?"

"I don't know exactly what she was given," Reid whispered back.

"Potentially?" Emily prompted.

"Maybe muscle spasms. And there would, um… there'd be coma, before… before death. But the thing we should keep an eye out for, later, if there's a later… seizures."

No one said anything for a long moment.

And then Morgan moved them forward:

"Let's get this done."

…

"This screams organized crime," Hotch noted, breaking the silence a few minutes later. "He wants to sound like a sadist, because that's the image that works in his world. But he's not. He would have administered the injection when she was awake. He would have wanted to see her fear."

"And he had this place ready," Emily added. "Despite the fact that he probably had a small time frame to work with, given that he only grabbed us a matter of hours before he needed the code cracked."

"He probably keeps this place ready," Reid offered up. "Whoever he accidentally tortured to death --"

"This guy," Morgan noted, holding up the file on the code's creator.

"Right," Reid acknowledged. "It probably happened earlier today."

Morgan sighed, rubbed the top of his head, his elbows up on the table.

"If this is organized crime, we're all dead no matter how this plays out."

"Maybe not," Reid countered, trying to inject a little hope into the situation. "We're not part of his world. We're federal agents. And we haven't seen his face."

"Leaving potential witnesses alive just isn't their game," Morgan said quietly, his tone heavy with the reality of the words.

"So we escape," Reid shot back. "That's what's left, right?"

No one said anything, at first.

Reluctant to buy into his optimism.

But the alternative – resignation – was unacceptable.

And so Morgan finally said aloud, thoughtfully:

"Our best bet is probably the time it takes him to go after the shipment. He probably won't let anything happen to us until he's sure he's got what he wants. And he'll be gone."

"He'll leave the other one," Emily pointed out, cautioning him. "He'll leave someone here."

"Still our best chance, us against one," Morgan returned.

They all looked to Hotch, waiting for him to challenge or support the plan.

But he didn't quite commit either way.

"The bottom line hasn't changed. Even to get to that point, we need to crack the code."

…

"It's all just numbers," Emily half moaned, frustrated. "How are we supposed to do anything with that?"

"Look for patterns," Reid said distractedly, tracing the page with his fingers. "I think the most commonly repeating pattern is 648."

"Are you sure?"

"No."

"Do you know what that would mean?"

"No."

Sighing, Emily turned her gaze back to the page.

He seemed to see at least some kind of hint in the series of digits.

She saw nothing.

Feeling useless, she threw an inquisitive spitball toward the others.

"If you had to create a code, what would you do?"

"Get Garcia to do it," Morgan answered, shrugging.

"Reid," Hotch admitted, his eyes still scanning the makeshift biography.

"I've never actually created a code," Reid piped up. "I just decipher them. But I'd probably consider all the methods I've heard of and try to put a new twist on one."

Prentiss turned her attention to Hotch.

"Does anything so far suggest this guy is of above average intelligence?"

"No."

"So he's like the rest of us. He has to use something simple enough that he can work with it," Emily tried, talking it through.

She was about to tell Reid to limit his considerations to the simpler methods he was familiar with, when JJ's voice called from across the room:

"Maybe the key is on the page and it just looks like more code."

They looked over at her, all eyebrows raised.

"That's actually not a bad idea," Reid acknowledged.

"It's sort of what I do," JJ offered, and her eyes fell shut for just a moment, but it was enough for Emily to get out of her chair and approach her, where she sat against the wall in the corner.

"How's that?" Emily asked, when she was close enough to look JJ in the eye.

"When I need a password, I use the serial number. On the thing itself. Computer, PDA… We don't all have Reid's memory. This way I never have to worry about forgetting."

"It's a good thought," Reid assured her, and she couldn't tell if he was humoring her or not.

The men went back to what they were doing, and Emily took a seat next to JJ on the floor.

"I'm not much use over there," Emily said quietly, and she reached out to cover JJ's hand with her own. "Maybe over here?"

JJ turned to face her, tears coming to her eyes at the gesture.

She half-nodded, her chin falling to her chest and failing to rise again.

"Yeah," she admitted, her voice nearly a whisper, and seemingly directed at the floor. "Yeah, why don't you stay."

…

"He's a computer buff," Hotch told Morgan a little bit later, when Reid got up to check the bands on JJ's arm.

"He's an arms dealer."

"He also deals in microchips. Unreleased technology."

"So?" Morgan asked, though he knew exactly what Hotch was getting at.

"He got into organized crime as some higher-up's computer tech. That's where he started. And that probably means that the only one of us who has a real chance of understanding the way his head works is --"

"Don't even say it!" Morgan said sharply. Then, lowering his voice: "We're not bringing her into this. We'll find another way."

"We could try to convince them to let us call her, pretend we're just working a case --"

"Hotch, come on, we tell them Garcia's the answer, they're gonna grab her too. You know that."

"Not if we play it right."

Hotch took a sidelong glance at JJ that felt very deliberate, almost manipulative.

But Morgan stood his ground, shook his head.

"Another way."

…

Trying to offer comfort and compassion to Jennifer Jareau was something like trying to cook for a chef, or write a play for Shakespeare.

And Emily felt incredibly helpless, looking into her face and knowing that she would know what to do.

There was just the faintest hint of a sheen of sweat beginning to form on JJ's creased forehead. And the skin at the top of the bridge of her nose wrinkled when she winced and closed her eyes against the headache.

Emily was at a loss.

It was worse than that day in Georgia, in that tiny bathroom, when she barely knew her and could tell herself that offering to get her out of the house for a while was enough.

It was different now that she knew her, now that she cared.

Different because JJ was in the process of _dying_, for god's sake, and there was nothing any of them could do.

She'd tried holding her hand. Tried distracting her with random anecdotes that started with 'Remember when…'

That had seemed to help for a while, but at the moment JJ was barely acknowledging her presence.

Emily looked over at the others, at where Hotch and Morgan were still reading, and where Reid was continuing to make notes on the surface of the table itself.

She was about to suggest that it might be more efficient to let Reid breeze through the file himself and return to working on the code, but before she could stand up she felt JJ's hand on her arm, and she turned to realize that JJ was using her as a hand-hold as she found her way to lying face-down on the cool floor.

"JJ?"

"It's cold," JJ murmured, her words appreciative rather than a complaint, as she tried unsuccessfully to press both her forehead and her arm against an area of the floor that neither of them had been sitting on. "We probably… we probably wouldn't be able to get them to give me ice…"

Somehow both dreading the answer and suspecting it would never actually come, Emily asked gently:

"Is it bad?"

After a beat, JJ whispered unsteadily:

"Getting there…"

And that she was actually admitting it out loud, that was enough.

That was _it_.

Emily stood quickly and approached the others, taking the chair next to Reid and stilling his pen with her hand.

He looked up at her, his expression asking why she'd done that.

"Can you fake it?" she asked him in a loud whisper, without the slightest bit of hesitation.

"What?" Reid's eyes narrowed, and he looked at her like she'd lost it.

Emily turned to face Hotch and Morgan, needing them all on her side.

"She's hurting," Emily spit out, gesturing behind her in JJ's general direction. "And just because we know how long before it becomes fatal – _if_ we take his word – doesn't mean we know how long before it causes permanent damage. So unless you're going to tell me that we're _thisclose_ to giving him a real answer?"

She looked from one of their faces to another, and none of them had anything to say to that.

Reid's gaze lingered on JJ, and Emily figured she probably had him on her side.

Hotch was, predictably, unreadable.

And Morgan spoke up:

"Something to actually do sounds pretty damn good to me right about now. But think it through, Em. Think it through. 'Cause if we send this guy on a wild goose chase and the whole escape thing doesn't turn out so good, he's gonna come back spitting nails. And the last guy he tried to use to solve this problem? He never meant to kill him." Turning his eyes to Hotch and Reid, he clarified: "I'm in if you're in. But you gotta know, we're putting our lives on the line here."

That agreed upon, Reid, Morgan and Emily all looked at Hotch expectantly, allowing him the final word.

And he couldn't be sure.

Because he knew Morgan was right.

If this didn't go right – and it probably wouldn't be easy – someone else was going to get hurt.

Maybe killed.

Of course, there was a good chance they'd all be killed rather than released, when this was over.

That was still true.

Escape was still their best chance.

And when the fact that JJ was suffering was factored in, now made more sense than later.

But it felt like a choice between likely-killed-in-a-rage soon versus likely-executed later, and none of it was good.

"Reid," he spoke up, finally.

"Yeah?"

Try now.

Pay later.

"Do you think you could convince him that you've figured it out?"

Hotch pressed his beginning-to-sweat palms against his knees, under the table.

Try now.

Pay later.

"Yeah," Reid answered. "If I had a few minutes to prepare, yes."

Hotch forced himself to look over at JJ.

They'd try now.

For her sake.

But he knew, with the same acid-in-his-stomach way he'd known his father would be ascending the stairs belt-in-hand, that they would pay later.

"Do it."

…


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's note: As has become my rather unfortunate custom, I apologize for the delay between chapters. I really am grateful for all the fantastic reviews. And to those of you who messaged me to spur me on – thanks. I think I needed that. _

_As per usual, I'd love to hear what you think. _

_Enjoy… _

**Incentive**

Chapter Four

…

_Desperate affairs require desperate remedies._

- British naval hero Horatio Nelson

…

It took Reid eight minutes to prepare a feigned revelation about the encoded message.

And as each minute ticked by, a few more knots tied themselves tightly in Morgan's stomach.

This next part, it called for action.

And the same way they all turned to Reid for facts, they turned to him when someone needed to be physically subdued.

Most days, that was fine.

Something like a feather in his cap.

But here and now, the odds were severely stacked against him.

The stakes were painfully high.

And it all had him just disconcerted enough to briefly consider Hotch's plan to call in Garcia.

Just enough to consider it.

But not enough to give in.

"Reid's just about ready," Emily said suddenly, breaking into his thoughts.

He turned to find her standing by his elbow.

"How's JJ?" he inquired, because he was pretty sure that a moment ago Emily had been across the room with her.

"A little short of breath. Otherwise…" She just barely shook her head, an inaudible sigh escaping her lips. "About the same."

Which was bad, Morgan figured, taking in the stress etched on Emily's face.

He waited a moment, letting that sink in, then got back to business.

"So Reid does his thing," he started to stay.

Emily cut him off:

"And then we do ours," she finished.

And that was good.

It always was good to have her by his side for this kind of thing.

"We'll have to give it a little believable time in between," Morgan told her. "Five minutes, maybe ten. We're going to need Reid to get the other one back in the room. He's not going to come in for anything less than information they need."

"So we have Reid call out that he made a mistake, that some detail of the message was wrong… and he has it right now…"

"And when Reid's got him distracted," Morgan agreed, "We jump him. I'm gonna grab for his arms, for the gun, keep it pointed at the ceiling. Hopefully I'm stronger than him, but it'll be easier if you follow me up with a blow to his legs."

Emily nodded, her distracted eyes on the ground, and then asked with concern:

"And if there are two of them?"

"We play it by ear."

"Hell of a lot easier said than done," Emily pointed out, dread in her tone.

"Lots of eye contact, lots of instinct," Morgan told her, noting Hotch approaching. "That's about all we'll have to work with."

"I'm more than willing to be a part of the physical effort --" Hotch started.

"Too many cooks," Morgan insisted, cutting him off. "We all try to get close, he'll see it coming."

"Then Reid and I will keep his attention in our direction," Hotch promised them both, nodding in agreement with what Morgan had said. "And stay out of the line of fire."

They exchanged confirming glances, and then Hotch shared:

"Reid's ready."

…

"It's really a combination of a simple substitution code and a more sophisticated ciphertext. He hides statistical information within the rest of the plaintext, in this case numerals, detectable only by their repeating pattern. By removing the repeating sets of numbers and using them as information for the transformation into simple substitution, I was able to --"

"The message, Agent Reid," The Dominant cut him off, somehow sounding both eager for the information and endlessly bored by Reid. "All I need is the message."

Reid dropped the page of numbers back on the table and nodded agreeably.

"South Street Storage, unit 11."

He spoke simply, reporting the location that he and Hotch had agreed upon for two reasons.

First, because it was a facility that housed both garage-like storage units and various sized lockers, and they didn't know exactly what this 'shipment' was or how much space it would believably take up.

And second, because wherever they were was likely rather remote, and the storage facility was downtown, and it would probably give them something like an hour before he could get there and back.

The '11' was something they'd chosen carefully, too, but it didn't matter yet.

That was the lie for later.

And it wouldn't matter if this first lie didn't work now.

Agonizing seconds ticked by as The Dominant seemed to consider their solution.

He stared Reid down, his finger tapping the side of his weapon.

Morgan spoke up, as casually as possible: "I've been there. It takes up most of the block, out behind The Auld Dubliner. You know the pub?"

"I don't need directions, Agent Morgan," The Dominant said, his tone clipped.

And a tense moment later, he turned to head for the door.

He offered parting words:

"For your sakes, I hope your Agent Reid is as good as he's supposed to be."

And then the door slammed shut.

And so they were left to wait the ten minutes they'd agreed to leave before taking further action, and to think about the fact that how good Reid was had nothing to do with anything, and to wonder about just where they were and how much time they had, and to worry about whether there was anyone left besides The Submissive, and to fear what would happen when they called him in.

And to listen, to JJ trying to breathe.

…

Each second that ticked by was one less second they'd have to escape.

That fact weighed on all of their minds.

Reid tried to distract himself by checking on JJ.

He knelt down, placed a gentle hand awkwardly on her arm, looked into her distressed eyes.

He was reluctant to ask her anything, because he didn't want to prompt her to speak, to waste her breath.

She was still drawing air into her lungs consistently enough that he wasn't worried about any lack of oxygen.

But he could see that it was a struggle.

And he knew that struggle would only get worse.

"Won't be long now," he promised her quietly, taking her hand. "Just a few minutes."

Her eyes grew suddenly worried, and he wondered if she'd forgotten the plan.

He knew Emily had filled her in.

"We're going to try to overpower whoever he left behind," he reminded her, but she wasn't listening to him.

Wasn't even looking at him, her focus instead on their hands.

"Reid --" she tried to say something, and he quickly stopped her.

"Just relax, okay? We'll handle everything."

"Spence!" Wide-eyed now, she spoke sharply, catching the attention of the others. "I can't…" She pulled in a breath. "Feel my fingers…"

She raised her alarmed gaze to look him in the eye.

And he looked down at her hand in his for a moment, feeling some of her panic bleed into him.

A slight shadow came over them, and Reid looked up to find Morgan standing above them.

"I don't think we should wait any more," Reid confided, hoping Morgan couldn't hear the threat of tears in his tone.

And Morgan nodded, his expression both uneasy and resolute.

"It's been almost seven minutes. Let's do this."

…

The man who entered at the sound of Reid's panicked yelling and door-pounding was too tall and bulky to be the man they'd known as The Submissive, and he was in blue jeans rather than The Submissive's black cargo pants.

And so everyone took note – there were at least three of them directly involved.

But where was The Submissive _now_? Was there only one thug left to contend with?

Morgan's mind was stuck on those two questions, as Reid began his practiced spiel.

"I had every reason to believe that I reported accurate information," Reid said to the masked man, his hands held up as if in surrender, his tone squeaky and apologetic. "But I made a mistake."

"What's that?" the new goon asked.

Morgan caught Emily's gaze, moving just a hair at a time toward the armed man.

"There was a notation that I took to be a number," Reid continued. "I thought it was an eleven. But looking at it now, I think it was Roman numerals 'II'. I think he needs unit two, not unit eleven."

Hotch must have sensed that they needed just a bit more time, a slightly better position, because he reached for the page of numbers and handed it to Reid.

Reid took the hint and pulled out the big guns, distracting the newcomer visually.

"It's really quite obvious if you look here at the way that he's --"

_-- BANG_!!!

A gunshot sounded at almost the same moment that Morgan grabbed for the gun.

A bullet tore into the wooden table top. In the corner, JJ screamed.

A horrible sense of impending doom and failure had a moment to register in Morgan's mind -- the guy was _too damn strong_ – but then Emily lunged at the bastard's legs.

He went down shooting.

Another bullet in the table, two in a chair.

And Morgan finally felt himself getting the upper hand, positioned on top of the fallen thug, getting control of the grip of the gun.

The other man hadn't quite released his own grip when Morgan finally had the weapon trained on _him_.

A collective sigh of relief was just beginning –

-- and was broken by another gunshot.

"_Fuck_," Morgan spit out, staring wide-eyed at the man below him as blood began to seep from a wound in the stranger's chest.

He turned to Emily, then Hotch, then Reid, his mouth gaping.

"He grabbed the damn trigger!" Morgan spit, feeling the need to defend himself. "He fucking shot _himself_!"

Hotch approached, took the gun from Morgan's hand, and suggested evenly:

"He probably thought it was the lesser evil. Better than letting the boss come back and find that he let us escape."

"Speaking of escape…" Emily knelt down by the already unconscious man, started going through his pockets.

"Are we okay?" a weakened voice called from behind them.

And Morgan turned to look back at JJ, wondering if she couldn't even raise her head to see.

"We're not hurt, JJ," he assured her, and since Reid was going to her and Hotch had taken a step in her direction, too, he stayed with Emily, with the man who might now be more accurately called 'the body'.

Emily had worked her way through his front pockets and was reaching under him, to the back pockets of his jeans.

She came up with a gadget – but it wasn't the remote for the door.

"Cell phone!" she exclaimed. Then, quieter: "Smashed."

She tried a few buttons anyway, but as Morgan started feeling his way through the guy's jacket pockets, she pitched the useless device at the wall.

She was cursing under her breath when Morgan felt the small, sleek device – and a surge of hope.

"Hey!" Morgan called out. "Hey…"

He hit the button even as he pulled the device from the dead man's pocket, and the door slid open.

He shot Emily a triumphant smile, and had it returned.

Hotch was right behind them as they rushed out into the adjoining room.

And the small room - it looked something like a space Garcia and Gideon would have shared.

A wraparound desk was half covered in a mess of papers, and the other half held a widescreen desktop computer.

There was another steel door, identical to the first.

Morgan aimed the remote and hit the button.

Nothing happened.

Or, rather, only the door behind him was affected, and it started to close.

Vaguely aware of Reid's cry of protest, he turned and re-opened the first door.

And then turned back to the one that was still a problem to be solved.

"Gotta be another one of these things," he told the others, holding up the remote in his hand, and as he started sifting through the mess on the desk, Emily went through the desk drawers.

Hotch, for his part, took a seat in front of the computer.

"This is a copy of the same stuff we had in there," Morgan noted, having recognized the pages.

"No phone in here?" Emily questioned, glancing over the desk.

"Would they risk trying to get a service provider into a place like this?" Hotch pointed out, his eyes on the computer screen. "They probably all had cell phones."

Emily slammed the last of the desk drawers with a sigh.

"Nothing. Not even our stuff, our cells. Maybe they left it in the vehicle."

"The computer any help?" Morgan asked, looking over Hotch's shoulder.

"Maybe," Hotch allowed. "He seems to have surveillance images from outside, so it's connected to something. But the system is nothing I recognize."

And Morgan had to agree.

Nothing about the images on screen was familiar to him, either.

It didn't look like Windows.

Just a list of black-and-white options, and a time code in the top right corner.

The list included 'DOOR CAM' and 'DRIVE CAM' and 'LOCK DOWN', but when Hotch tried to click the mouse, a prompt box wanted a password.

Emily muttered a curse under her breath. Then, louder: "JJ's got less than five hours."

Hotch turned to face Morgan, a meaningful question in his eyes.

Pushing out an angry breath through his teeth, Morgan looked away.

"Morgan!" Reid's voice echoed from the attached room. "I can't… I…"

And Morgan looked up, turned to find that the kid was struggling to lift JJ in his arms.

It seemed a bit pointless, since they couldn't go anywhere yet anyway.

But then, being in that room with the dead body wasn't appealing to him, either.

Morgan went to them, gathered JJ in his own arms. Winced at the cry that escaped her lips.

The three of them were just joining Hotch and Emily in the other room when Emily spoke up:

"At least we have the gun."

Hotch looked down at the weapon in his hands.

He released the clip, to count the number of bullets that remained.

And Morgan was pretty sure he could actually _see_ the color drain from his boss's face.

The clip was empty.

…

Waiting to take action had been rough.

But waiting to have action taken against them, that was a kind of hell on earth.

There was something like acid rolling in Hotch's stomach again.

He'd been here before.

He'd spent most of his childhood here.

Waiting.

He remembered it too well.

The slow build of terror.

Knowing that when that beer can was popped open… when that dish was broken…

Sooner or later, he'd feel the burning smack that would later be a bruise.

And then there'd be another one, and another.

He closed his eyes, leaned his head against the wall behind him.

Cursed the feeling of helplessness that was supposed to be long gone.

He wasn't supposed to ever be in this place anymore.

He opened his eyes again, forced himself to take stock of the situation.

Off to his right, Morgan was rubbing his sore shoulder.

He'd actually tried to break down the thick steel door.

But he was in much better shape than JJ, whose breathing was more shallow and painstaking than ever.

Her arm was more swollen than ever, too.

Her eyes, when they were open, told Hotch she was in considerable pain.

And if the reality of this kind of monstrous _waiting_ hadn't been filling his mind, he might have gone to her and tried to offer comfort.

But Emily and Reid were on that.

And he was free to get lost in his head.

Free to focus on the _physical_ fear he felt so acutely that he actually _wished_ that The Dominant would return and just get it all over with.

He wished this, right up until the second that it actually happened.

And then he froze.

The door slid open, and Hotch couldn't move as he took in the sight of The Dominant striding purposefully into the room, his face red with rage.

He only stared as the other man put the barrel of his gun _against Reid's head_.

"Please…" Reid nearly whimpered.

And it seemed to Hotch that Morgan was saying something, too.

It seemed that The Submissive had come in and marched to the other room and reported back about their dead partner.

But Hotch barely heard any of it, because he was lost in summoning up the courage to do what he had to do.

He was the one to intervene.

It was his job.

It always had been.

He'd lived _that_ for years, too.

And as he started to find his footing, he tried not to think about how much worse this would be.

He tried not to consider that getting between Reid and a bullet was going to hurt so much more than getting between Sean and a fist.

He took one step forward as Reid pleaded again for his life.

"Please… you don't… I can still do this for you, probably better than anyone…"

Hotch took another step.

The Dominant's voice boomed:

"I _warned_ you that I _don't_ need _four_ of you!!"

And as his finger tightened on the trigger, and Hotch opened his mouth to claim the ruse had been all his idea, Morgan cried out:

"I can get you what you need!"

And all eyes, Hotch and The Dominant's included, turned to him.

"You hear me?" Morgan continued. "I've got the solution. You want to hear it? You deal with _me_."

The Dominant hesitated, considered.

Finally, he swiped the barrel against Reid's head – just enough to intimidate, barely enough to hurt – and shoved Emily down on the floor next to him.

Keeping his weapon trained on them, he turned to where Morgan and Hotch stood.

"You know what they say, Agent Morgan," The Dominant said quietly. "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…"

"No games this time," Morgan told him, shaking his head for emphasis.

And Hotch saw Morgan take in a deep breath and commit to doing what he had so desperately wanted to avoid.

"We have a computer systems analyst," Morgan admitted, his tone flat, his eyes full of murder. "And your guy, the one who came up with this damn thing, he was big into computers. We think she's our best bet." He paused, but only for a moment. "Her name is Penelope Garcia. 107 Levensworth. Building called Stanford Arms. Apartment 3G."

He paused again, longer this time, and Hotch thought he detected a trace of moisture in his eyes, for just a split-second, before he promised:

"She gets hurt, I'm gonna find a way to watch you bleed."

…


	5. Chapter 5

_Author's note: Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed, and special thanks to everyone who messaged me to encourage me to finish this. _

_I took a little bit of creative license with a couple of things. As per usual, while I've done some research, I apologize if there are any technical or medical inaccuracies._

_It's been a joy writing about the team as a whole. If you love them as much as I do, I think you'll like this._

…

Chapter Five

...

_The important thing to recognize is that it takes a team._

- Auto Executive Philip Caldwell

…

He felt like a competent adult again.

Like a leader.

Maybe like a parent.

With the fear of an impending beating gone and hope renewed, Hotch found that he could take stock of the state that the rest of his team was in.

And while none of it was good, it felt good to be back in control.

Especially since everyone else looked so close to losing it.

Reid had gone back to fighting to make sense of the code, and in his desperate fervor he'd snapped his pen in two. The blue ink that stained his hands and clothes was a constant visual reminder that they were all dangerously tense.

As if the sight of JJ wasn't enough.

He wasn't close enough to see the fear that he knew lurked in her eyes, but there was something about the posture of her limbs that was unsettling and distracting. Judging by the way Emily was gripping her hand, he wondered if the muscle spasms Reid had mentioned as a possibility had become a reality.

And then there was Morgan, who had a death stare locked on the steel door, and didn't seem to have so much as blinked since sending their captor after Garcia.

Hotch saw him leap to his feet, and realized the door was opening.

A second later, Morgan caught Garcia as she was shoved inside.

"Baby Girl --"

"What the --"

"Are you hurt?"

"Are you?"

Morgan quickly shook his head 'no', focused on her.

"Hey, hey, if they so much as touched you…?"

She just barely shook her head, scanning the room, distracted.

"JJ?"

Her face filled with surprise and concern, and Hotch stepped between her and Morgan, needing to get her on task.

"What's --" Garcia started, trying to move toward JJ.

"Some kind of invenomation," Hotch filled in, stopping her. "We don't know what it was, but we do know that she's running out of time, and so I need you to listen to me."

He waited a moment, for her gaze to move from JJ to him.

And when it didn't –

"Garcia!"

Her head turned.

"What's going on?"

He made quick work of an explanation.

"The man who brought us here wants a code cracked. It was created by some kind of programmer or analyst. You need to take a look and tell us what you see."

Garcia just looked at him for a moment, slack-jawed. Probably in a bit of shock.

And if he'd had the time to be gentle and understanding about that, he would have been.

"Here," he said instead, not unkindly, pulling her to the table. "Sit down."

He shoved the ink-stained page of numbers under her nose, and then sat down next to her.

She looked up at Reid, opened her mouth to ask a question.

"He already tried," Hotch cut her off before she could even get started.

She finally turned her eyes to the paper in front of her.

And it took only a few seconds for her to look up again, completely lost.

"What am I looking for?"

"Anything," Hotch told her, softening his tone. "Anything that strikes you. Some kind of pattern."

She stared blankly at him, her eyes saying that it seemed a hopeless task.

He wanted to scream.

But he was the boss, and control was his thing.

And so he grabbed up the folder of information they'd received about the code's creator.

"Let's take a look at this…"

…

When Hotch and Garcia were knee-deep in wading through the file folder, Morgan gave her a gentle clap on the back and stepped away.

He stood back and watched her.

Reassuring himself that she didn't look like she'd been hurt.

Telling himself that he hadn't chosen Reid's life over hers.

"Hi."

Reid voice broke into his thoughts, sounding awkward. Even for him.

"Something wrong?" Morgan asked.

"Uh… everything?" An uncertain half-smile just barely reached Reid's lips.

Morgan nodded, looking him over, wondering what the look on his face was about.

Did the kid look… guilty? Touched?

"You okay?" Morgan asked him. "You need something?"

It took Reid a moment of staring at the floor, and then he admitted, his voice quiet:

"I don't know whether to say 'thank you' or 'I'm sorry'."

Morgan heard him loud and clear, knew exactly what he was saying.

But still he asked, already setting up a trail of breadcrumbs in his head:

"Sorry for what, Reid?"

And Reid looked up and met his eyes, surprised at the question.

"For… Garcia. For you, for… for having to get her here."

"For needing to be saved? What, you figure we should be blaming JJ, too?"

Confusion registered on Reid's face, along with a hint of offense.

"Of course not. But I was the one who…" Reid struggled for the words. "I made him angry."

"Because you tricked him."

"Right."

"Which was Emily's idea. And Hotch's choice."

Reid sighed a sigh that made his shoulders rise and fall, then rubbed his eyes with his ink-stained middle fingers, and took up a place at Morgan's side, leaning against the wall.

A moment passed in silence.

But he still hadn't made peace.

"It was still me or Garcia --"

"No," Morgan said quickly, and maybe more harshly than he should have. "No, I didn't make that choice. It was her safety for your life."

Even as he said it, Morgan still didn't feel good about it.

But what the hell was he supposed to do?

He'd feel a hell of a lot worse if Reid was dead on the floor.

They all would.

And the thing was…

"Look, Reid, here's what makes this something more like 'okay' for me: Garcia would have chosen the same thing I did. I believe that. She'd have put herself here in this place to save your life."

Reid's eyes fell on Garcia at that.

And he seemed a hair less troubled as he noted:

"She would have done it for JJ, anyway, right?"

"Right," Morgan agreed, and that lifted the weight from his shoulders a bit, too.

But even looking less troubled, Reid still looked incredibly solemn. And so Morgan spoke up again:

"But don't go kidding yourself. She'd have done it for you, too. I have it on good authority that everybody's favorite tech goddess sees you as one of her brothers."

Reid just barely smiled at that, but the smile was genuine.

And maybe it was just that they'd almost lost him today, but Morgan couldn't help pushing that a little further.

"She's not the only one," he admitted casually, like it was nothing.

And then he quickly moved to go check in with Hotch and Garcia, to avoid the moment.

"You have all sisters," Reid pointed out, confused.

And Morgan turned back.

Just a wee bit irritated.

"So? Guess I had an opening," he tossed out with a shrug.

Reid smiled again, just a bit wider this time, looking for all the world like a contented five-year-old.

And Morgan shook his head, walked away.

Little brother, indeed.

…

Morgan and Reid had been talking just loudly enough for Emily to overhear them, sitting on the cold floor several feet away.

She could relate.

It was nice, these pseudo-sibling relationships they all had going on.

Or it would have been, under different circumstances.

This whole thing probably would have been a hell of a lot easier if it didn't feel like she was watching her little sister die.

JJ's hands were ice cold in hers.

But at least the muscle spasms had stopped.

She felt guilty for thinking it, since it might well mean the toxin was working itself into another stage.

But at least JJ _looked_ more at peace when she was still.

"Garcia's looking hopeful," she told JJ quietly.

It was a blatant lie.

But she'd long ago asked herself what JJ would do if their situations were reversed.

And telling people what they needed to hear – that was JJ's thing.

She'd fallen into the habit of rubbing JJ's shoulder, but her hand stilled when JJ suddenly spoke up.

"If I pass out…" JJ murmured, and Emily leaned in to hear her. "And if that's just it for me --"

"No one's giving up --"

"Hey, promise me… you'll come up with some really brilliant last words for me, okay?"

Emily looked her over, struck.

Was she joking?

"Something…" JJ continued, sounding half serious. "Something that would be worthy… of a liaison…"

"By the time you need last words, you're going to have to come up with something worthy of someone's grandmother," Emily insisted, blinking back the tears that threatened to come to her eyes.

JJ managed to meet her gaze for the first time in a while, tears in her own tormented eyes.

And she whispered:

"Denial's a horrible thing to lose."

And then she started shaking.

Out of nowhere, without warning.

Her body absolutely convulsed. Head arched back, every muscle straining.

And even though she could already hear his rapid footsteps, Emily cried out:

"_Reid!!_"

…

He came running.

But there was very little he could do.

"Don't restrain her," he instructed Emily. "Let it happen…"

And then, because it was ugly and awful and the sounds coming from JJ's throat were inhuman, he half instructed and half prayed:

"Just let it end…"

Excruciatingly long seconds crawled by. He wasn't sure how many.

And then JJ stilled, and Emily looked up at him for further instructions.

There were tears on her face.

"She needs to be in the recovery position," Reid told her. "On her side. You know how to do that?"

"Yes," Emily responded immediately, grateful for something to do.

Morgan bent down to help, as familiar with basic first aid as the rest of them.

And Reid fisted his stained hands…

And tried to ignore the voice in his head that screamed that she was going to die.

There was less than two hours left on the clock.

_She was going to die. _

Right here in front of them.

A sob caught in his throat almost before tears reached his eyes.

"Reid…"

It was Hotch, standing just beside him.

"Reid, it's not over yet."

He turned, looked Hotch in the eye.

Broke down right in front of him.

"I'm trying so, so, so hard…"

"Reid --"

"The stupid numbers just, like, refuse to mean anything…"

"Reid, you are going to do this," Hotch intoned, refusing him any pity. "You're going to sit down at the table with Garcia, and the two of you are going to figure this out."

Reid sniffled, tried to get it together.

He dreaded laying eyes on that page of elusive numbers for the hundredth time.

But if there was any chance at all…

And Hotch's determined eyes said there was…

"You and me," Garcia encouraged, even though she looked about as broken as he felt.

Hotch put a hand on his shoulder, turned him toward the table.

And he felt himself nodding, committing, even before his rational mind had caught up with the mess of emotion.

He found himself almost running to the table.

Desperation hit hard.

And served him well.

He rushed through the questions:

"There are a total of one-thousand-forty-seven digits. Does that mean anything to you?"

"No."

"The only break is after the first two-hundred-thirty-four digits. Does that mean anything to you?"

"No."

"The most frequently appearing patterns occur in threes. Does that mean anything to you?"

"No."

"The most frequently occuring pattern is six-four-eight. Does that mean anything to you?"

"No."

"The most --"

"Wait!"

His eyes jumped to her face.

Hope attacked him.

"Wait?"

"I need a computer!" Excitement nearly had her slurring her words. "I need a computer, I need a computer!"

Reid looked to Hotch, who moved to bang on the steel door.

"We've got something!" And then, his mask of control slipping: "Get in here!!"

"Microsoft… standard English…" Garcia muttered, and Reid was about to press her for information when the steel door slid away, and The Dominant stepped into the room, The Submissive just behind him.

"I need a computer!" Garcia repeated herself, high-pitched.

"If this is a game," The Dominant started. "So help you God --"

"No games --"

"Wait there!" He ordered.

And he left the door open, guarded by his partner, while he marched into the adjoining room, to his computer.

The password that had foiled their group earlier was no problem for him, and Reid paid close attention, straining his eyes and ears.

Four keys.

On the numeric keypad.

More numbers.

"There's no Internet connection," The Dominant informed Garcia as he returned.

"No worries," Garcia tossed out, beelining for the computer.

The Dominant was on her heels, and Reid had to move cautiously to follow, but neither of their captors tried to stop him.

And he watched as her hands flew over the keyboard.

Mostly the numeric keypad.

And it was like magic.

She hit the numbers.

And words started to come up on screen.

G-R-E-E-N

How was she doing this?

"Garcia --"

"Alt codes."

"What?"

"They're used mostly for special symbols. But they can bring up standard characters, too. Any Tom, Dick or henchmen could decode this if he knew what it was."

Her fingers kept flying as they talked, and since he wasn't distracting her from the task, he went ahead and asked her:

"How did you know?"

"Three digit patterns. And the common six-four-eight. It brings up 'E', which --"

"-- is the most common letter in the English language," he finished for her.

He could feel The Dominant literally breathing down his neck.

The miserable jerk was almost as stressed as they were about the clock running down.

"You want the Green Street Bus Station," Garcia announced. "Locker 62. The rest is starting to look like instructions on what to do with the shipment when --"

"You're finished," The Dominant interrupted, pulling her chair back from the computer.

He hit a few keys on the computer almost in the same second that he headed for the door.

"Let's go!"

"Both of us?" The Submissive questioned, surprise ringing in his tone. "Danny's dead --"

"Both of us! Move! I need a bodyguard more than they need a guard."

The other door slid open.

Hotch called out:

"Hey!"

Reid joined in:

"You have to let us --"

But the door shut again before he could even finish.

And then suddenly all was disturbingly quiet.

And hope slipped away again.

…

It was all a blur to JJ.

Like the world was coming at her from under water.

She knew they were yelling only by the desperation in their voices.

Garcia:

"But we've never seen his face! That means hope! You taught me that!"

Morgan:

"This is organized crime, Mama --"

Emily:

"We've got access to his computer! If it controls the cameras, who's to say it can't control the doors?"

Reid:

"Like in Jurassic Park!"

Hotch:

"We have to get past the password first."

Reid:

"It was all numbers! Four digits, on the keypad. But that's… that's ten thousand possible combinations."

Emily:

"Can you hack past it?"

Garcia:

"Probably, but it would take some time."

Morgan:

"Which we don't have. _Goddamn-son-of-a-bitch!_"

Something fell.

Or got thrown.

Maybe a chair.

And they kept yelling, about whether to take the time to search the documents in the desk.

She tuned them out.

Something had occurred to her.

And she wasn't sure what it was.

Her mind wouldn't cooperate.

But there was something in what they'd said…

Some connection…

Beyond the pain, and the colors meshing before her eyes…

Somewhere in the back of her head…

A link between the words they'd used…

Four.

Digits.

Password.

Time.

She tried to speak, couldn't get her tongue to cooperate.

It was so simple.

Why couldn't they see it?

"Time…" she managed to whisper.

But all it did was bring Emily back to her side, get her rubbing her shoulder again, assuring her time wasn't up yet.

"It's the time…"

"Jaje, you're gonna be fine," Garcia's voice insisted.

"The password…" she rasped, "…is the time…"

They went silent.

Or seemed to.

And she just barely heard whoops of joy, a moment later.

And then there was nothing.

…

They were all there when JJ woke up.

Hotch stood back and watched as Garcia embraced her, and Reid told her she was going to be fine, and Emily muttered a quiet 'thank God', and Morgan started cracking ironic blonde jokes.

Maybe it was the sun streaming into the room and the fact that they'd won the battle, but…

Hotch couldn't quite keep a smile from gracing his face.

He didn't want to.

And he realized, standing there watching them, that above all else he felt pride.

They were a team.

They were _such a team_.

They were _his team_.

And even with their own lives on the line, they'd all done their part.

Reid and Garcia solved puzzles.

Morgan and Emily took the bad guys down and kept the good guys breathing.

JJ came up with a flash of brilliance when they needed it.

And there was more to it than that, of course, and they all traded roles now and then.

But they did their parts.

They did their thing.

And then there was him.

And he'd never be so presumptuous as to say that he was the glue that held them all together.

At most, he might admit that he was quite good at keeping the rest of them on task.

He'd never tell anyone that sometimes… when he noticed them using skills that he'd taught them… or pulled them through a rough patch…

Sometimes it was like he was neither a bad father nor a distracted hero.

Sometimes it was like he was a good father, in a family of heroes.

He'd never say that out loud.

But just this once, watching a card game break out around a hospital bed, and calling out to his youngest (agent) to deal him in, he indulged his mind.

And he let himself think it.

…


End file.
